A Second Chance

There have been modern art museums in many of the cities we have visited, but frankly after the Pompidou Center experience we have been turned off modern art. However, since we had already paid for it and they had a few Andy Warhol pieces, we decided to visit Museum Ludwig.

The museum had a wonderful temporary exhibit of Gerhard Richter's work, the artist that designed the new stain-glass window in the Dom. In addition to the huge pieces of abstract work, they had a collection of 100, paired painted glasses pieces that were gorgeous. I would love to have one of those in my home.

In addition, the museum had a neat audio exhibit from Paul Plamper called A Radio Play in Space. It was a room filled with tables; on each tables was 2-5 speakers (symbolizing the number of people sitting at the table) and 2-5 chairs. When you entered the room you were greeted with the ambient noise of a restaurant; you could sit down at any of the tables and listen to the conversation. Then something happens; sometimes inside the restaurant, sometimes outside the restaurant and a collective hush falls over the room. It is social experiment in whether people will become involved in the event or become distant.

Other highlights of the museum included:

• 20th century American Pop Art
• A temporary exhibit for filmmaker Jonas Mekas
• A wonderful graphic design exhibit of Thomas Bayrle
• An exhibit titled "Looking for Mushrooms, Beat Poets, Hippies, Funk,and Minimal Art: Art and counter cultural in San Fransisco around 1968"

Maybe the art wasn't so modern, maybe it wasn't so out there, but we definitely enjoyed Museum Ludwig. So much so that we might venture into a modern art museum in the city we visit.

Amsterdam

On Sunday we gave my dad the whirlwind tour of Amsterdam. This, of course, included starting the day with chocolate waffles.After starting in Dam Square, we walked through the center of Amsterdam, through the Jordaan District, past Anne Frank's house, by the Homomonument, around the church where Rembrandt is buried, and through the floating flower markets.

Next up was lunch, where we introduced my dad to Indonesian Cuisine at Restaurant Kantjil en de Tijger. Indonesia was once a colony of the Netherlands, so there are quite a lot of Indonesian restaurants and stores around. Lunch was delicious! We ate huge bowls of noodles, vegetables, rice, and meat. Matt's came with a coconut sauce and Dad's and mine came with a peanut butter sate sauce. And of course, it was washed down with a round of Belgium beers.After lunch, we visit the Dutch Resistance Museum. It was a wonderful, informative museum that told the story of Dutch from the late nineteen-thirties until after liberation. The museum was exceptionally well put together, with interactive displays, a multimedia guide, lots of artifacts, informative text, videos, and sound recordings, and tons of photographs. I would highly recommend this museum to anyone visiting Amsterdam. After over two hours, we found ourselves being ushered out by the docents as we had stayed past closing.

And then, it was back to Delft...